When he had spoken a few words the convict interrupted him with the abrupt question, ‘How much?’ ‘Eight years,’ answered Bramwell, without saying another word.
In 1876, upon the establishment of the court of appeal under the Judicature Acts, Bramwell was appointed one of the lords justices with universal approbation. He held that office until the close of 1881, when he retired after twenty-six years' judicial service. He was memorably entertained at dinner by the bar of England in the Inner Temple Hall upon his retirement. Early in 1882 he was created a peer by the title of Baron Bramwell of Hever, and thereafter sat frequently in the House of Lords on the hearing of appeals. Many of his judgments both in the court of appeal and in the House of Lords were models of forcible conciseness, and for the strength and clearness of his understanding he had few equals on the bench.
Bramwell published no book, but during his tenure of judicial office, and more particularly after his resignation, he not unfrequently addressed letters to the newspapers upon the topics in which he took an interest. In later years these were usually signed ‘B.,’ and were so characteristic in style and substance as to be instantly recognisable by those who were interested. He was always interested in political economy, and to the end of his life strove vigorously in the House of Lords and in the columns of the ‘Times’ for freedom of contract—meaning the unchecked power of making contracts, and the means of enforcing them after they were made—and the cognate matters which had been the popular commonplaces of the middle of the century, and underwent so much socialistic modification in its last quarter. He became a champion of the ‘Liberty and Property Defence League,’ and never slackened in his efforts on account of the want of success which attended them. He died at his country house, Holmwood, near Edenbridge, on 9 May 1892, and was buried at Woking.
In or about 1829 Bramwell married Mary Jane, daughter of Bruno Silva. She died on 13 April 1836, leaving two daughters, one of whom is living. He married secondly, in 1861, Martha Sinden, who died at 17 Cadogan Place on 5 June 1889 in her fifty-fourth year (G. E. C[okayne], Complete Peerage, ‘Corrigenda,’ viii. 320).
No portrait of Bramwell is known to be in existence, but a reproduction of a good and characteristic photograph of him as he appeared in his old age forms the frontispiece of Mr. C. Fairfield's memoir.
[Some Account of George William Wilshire, Baron Bramwell of Hever, and his Opinions, by Charles Fairfield (London, 1898); private information; personal recollections.]
BRAND, Sir HENRY BOUVERIE WILLIAM, first Viscount Hampden and twenty-third Baron Dacre (1814–1892), born on 24 Dec. 1814, was the second son of Henry Otway Brand, twenty-first Baron Dacre, by his wife Pyne, second daughter of the Hon. and Very Rev. Maurice Crosbie, dean of Limerick. The barony of Dacre had passed through the female line to the Fiennes family [see Fiennes, Thomas, ninth Baron Dacre], from them to the Lennards [see Lennard, Francis, fourteenth Baron Dacre], and from them to Charles Trevor Roper, eighteenth Baron Dacre (1745-1794); the eighteenth baron's sister Gertrude married Thomas Brand of The Hoo, Hertfordshire, father of Thomas Brand, twentieth Baron Dacre (whose wife was Barbarina Brand, lady Dacre [q. v.]), and great-grandfather of Viscount Hampden. Hampden's elder brother Thomas succeeded as twenty-second Baron Dacre, but died without issue in 1890, when the barony of Dacre devolved upon Viscount Hampden.
Brand was educated at Eton, where in 1829 he was in the lower division of the fifth form (Stapylton, Eton School Lists, p. 139). He did not proceed to any university, and on 16 April 1838, when twenty-three years of age, married Eliza, daughter of General Robert Ellice (1784-1856) and his wife Eliza Courtenay. His first political employment began in 1846, when he became private secretary to Sir George Grey [q. v.], secretary of state for home affairs. On 6 July 1852 he entered parliament as member for Lewes, for which he was re-elected on 27 March 1857, 29 April 1859, and 13 July 1865. On 26 Nov. 1868 he was returned for Cambridgeshire, which he continued to represent until his elevation to the peerage. For a few weeks in the spring of 1858 Brand was keeper of the privy seal to the prince of Wales, and on 9 June 1859 he succeeded Sir William Goodenough Hayter [q. v.] as parliamentary secretary to the treasury. He held this post under Palmerston and Russell until July 1866, when Derby came into power, and he continued to act as senior liberal whip for the two years during which the liberals were in opposition. When Gladstone took office in 1868 Brand was not included in the administration, his place at the treasury being occupied by George Grenfell Glyn, afterwards Baron Wolverton [q. v.]; but when John Evelyn Denison (afterwards Viscount Ossington)
